These days, New Jersey pilots may find themselves in a neighborhood gathering where other people are expressing frustration, fear, and anger over the lack of answers regarding nighttime lights so widely reported in the sky. For those pilots who fly after sunset, it’s probably a good idea to speak up when the chants of “shoot ‘em down!” start. It’s increasingly likely that those folks are not fully aware that airliners, law enforcement aircraft, and even innocent GA pilots, could find themselves inadvertently in the crosshairs.
Jonathon: I fly in the central NJ area…home to ‘bastions’ of ‘higher learning’ such as Rutgers and Princeton…you would be surprised what mischief ostensibly highly educated people are capable of, regardless of their magazine reading habits.
Has anybody landed on 24L at KDAY? just to your left are a bunch of people shooting shotguns in the direction of your airplane…… It is home of the Trapshooting Hall of Fame. I’m sure the FAA has measured the effectiveness of shot gun pellets and determined that this is a safe operation. Shotguns have almost no range that will do harm to man or beast if loaded with trap rounds. Even doubling the range with higher power options will still be have negilible effect. So John Q publick has very little chance to bag a drone unless he is within range that you could use a flyswatter on. Elevated shooting angles and using other weapons there is a 100% chance the rounds will land some place unintended and the drone has <1% of coming down. MORONS
I think the only reasonable thing to do at this point is to fall back across the Delaware and surrender New Jersey. Maybe the invaders could fix what’s wrong with the Jets.
Well, it doesn’t help much when the President Elect goes on Truth Social and television and says we need to “shoot them down”, in spite of the fact that he has not received any briefing on what is actually going on. Ready fire aim!
Many people around the country have been posting video of drones flying over their heads. The regulations clearly state against such operations. The UAS operator is also in violation if flying over 400 feet AGL.
No person may operate a small unmanned aircraft over a human being unless -
(a) That human being is directly participating in the operation of the small unmanned aircraft;
(b) That human being is located under a covered structure or inside a stationary vehicle that can provide reasonable protection from a falling small unmanned aircraft; or
(c) The operation meets the requirements of at least one of the operational categories specified in subpart D of this part.
I don’t know if it’s still there, but I remember crossing from NJ to find a “Welcome to Pennsylvania” billboard with the slogan, “Where America Begins!” Made me wonder, “Then where have I just been?”
